Awesome Austin Green Videos

[1THING] Blog: Archive for February, 2013

Friends from Entercom Madison wanted to get the word out about the cranes. Come to find out Whooping Cranes spend a lot of time in along the Gulf Coast of Texas during the winter time.

Soaring to New Heights: The International Crane Foundation

In 1941, there were only 23 whooping cranes on the entire planet, pushed to the brink of extinction by overhunting and loss of habitat. Now, thanks to organizations including the International Crane Foundation in Baraboo, Wisconsin, their number is now in the hundreds.

The International Crane Foundation was founded in 1973, dedicated to preserving all 15 species of crane worldwide. The non-profit organization is dedicated to research, education, habitat protection, captive breeding and reintroduction of cranes into their natural habitat.

Near their headquarters in central Wisconsin, ICF is studying wild sandhill cranes to learn more about their habitats, how the population develops, and interactions between cranes and people. ICF is also a key partner in current efforts to return the whooping crane to the eastern United States. They support this work through captive breeding, monitoring, ecosystem research and education. ICF is also working to protect and restore water supplies and habitat for whooping cranes in other regions, including the wintering area for the last naturally occurring population along the Gulf Coast of Texas.

But the work of the foundation doesn’t stop on this continent. They’re also involved in crane preservation efforts in China, Africa, and Russia.

The work of ICF has earned them numerous accolades. Earlier this year, founder George Archibald was awarded the Audubon Society’s $100,000 lifetime conservation achievement prize, one of the richest environmental awards in the world.

The International Crane Foundation is open to the public from April 15-0ctober 30. Go to www.savingcranes.org for more information.

Here’s a pix of Texas Whooping Cranes:

The Guadalupe River is a big deal for the Whooping Cranes…

The Guadalupe River supplies freshwater to the coastal marshes of the Gulf of Mexico and the wintering area of the last naturally occurring Whooping Cranepopulation. The Whooping Cranes migrate over 2,500 miles from their breeding grounds in western Canada to winter on the coastal wetlands near and within the boundaries of Aransas National Wildlife Refuge in southeastern Texas. The freshwater from the Guadalupe River is essential for the cranes and their main winter food source, blue crabs, but the river and coastal wetlands are threatened by excessive upstream water use.

On their wintering grounds along the Gulf Coast of Texas, Whooping Cranes feed almost exclusively on blue crabs (below). The coastal marshes provide excellent habitat for the crabs if salinity levels remain moderate, which is determined primarily by the amount of freshwater flowing into the coastal waters from the Guadalupe River basin. “ICF is undertaking new research and outreach activities in Texas to support the long-term survival of Whooping Cranes on their wintering grounds.”

Wednesday, February 27, 2013 | By Great Energy Challenge | No Comments

Crude oil production in the United States surpassed 7 million barrels per day (bpd) in November last year, the first time since December 1992 that output reached that level. According to numbers released by the U.S. Energy Information Administration today, the U.S. produced 7.013 million bpd in November and 7.030 million bpd in December.

How long can this crude oil boom last? That is a matter of debate, as Great Energy Challenge blogger and Duke University scientist Bill Chameides notes, pointing out that some observers think the longevity of this boom has been overstated. Most recently, geoscientist J.David Hughes, writing in the journal Nature, questioned certain EIA projections on shale gas and oil output, concluding, “Declaring U.S. energy independence and laying plans to export the shale bounty is unwise.”

But at least in the short term, the boom is expected to continue. The EIA forecasts that crude oil production will continue its upward trend for the next two years, hitting more than 7.8 million bpd in 2014.

“We’ve made progress in Alaska, but this is a long-term programme that we are pursuing in a safe and measured way,” said Marvin Odum, director of Shell’s Upstream Americas division. “Our decision to pause in 2013 will give us time to ensure the readiness of all our equipment and people following the drilling season in 2012.”

Shell never drilled into oil-bearing formations in the Arctic last year, but completed top-hole drilling on two wells in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, marking the industry’s return to offshore drilling in the Alaskan Arctic after more than a decade. (Related: “Ice-Breaking: U.S. Oil Drilling Starts as Nations Mull Changed Arctic“) Shell noted the drilling was completed safely, with no serious injuries or environmental impact.

But other troubles beset its two specially equipped rigs. Its drill rig, the Noble Discoverer, slipped its anchor in Alaska’s Dutch Harbor last summer before heading north, and after it returned in the fall, a small fire broke out aboard ship. But it was a mishap with Shell’s other rig, the Kulluk, that mobilized an extraordinary rescue and recovery drama. A violent storm caused it to lose its mooring to tow ships and run aground on New Year’s Eve. (Related: “Pictures: Errant Shell Oil Rig Runs Aground Off Alaska”)The U.S. Coast Guard-led response, including a rescue of the crew by helicopter, eventually involved more than 700 people.

The incident ended with no spill of the diesel fuel or oil products that the Kulluk carried. But Shell said that both the Kulluk and the Discoverer will be towed to Asia for maintenance and repairs.

Because Shell’s permits for drilling in the Arctic were predicated on use of the two rigs, the decision to forgo drilling this season is not unexpected. But how long a “pause” in Shell’s plans will depend not only on the company’s own timetable, but on U.S. regulators. After the Kulluk incident, U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar ordered a 60-day review of last year’s Arctic drilling program, the results of which are expected by the end of next week.

Although none of Shell’s mishaps involved drilling, some environmentalists are urging a revamp of the exploration plan to include more stringent safeguards, while many others are working to halt drilling altogether.

“It appears Shell is realizing they need to take a more careful approach to ensure they don’t put the Arctic’s people and marine life at risk,” said Marilyn Heiman, director of the Pew Charitable Trusts’ U.S. Arctic Program, in an email. “The causes of last year’s mishaps must be remedied so they do not occur in the future. It’s time that all parties, from the administration and local communities to conservation groups and industry sit down and develop world class industry standards and ecological and cultural protections to safeguard the Arctic.”

David Yarnold, president of the National Audubon Society, however, maintains spills will happen no matter how careful the oil companies are. ”Shell has seen the ice. Or the light,” he said in a prepared statement. “Drilling amid ice floes in the neighborhood of nurseries for threatened wildlife isn’t either smart or safe. Shell seems to have come to its senses for now – but how many accidents did it take?”

But Shell, which has invested more than $4.5 billion in leases and equipment for exploration in the Alaskan Arctic, said it is committed to drilling there in the future. “Alaska remains an area with high potential for Shell over the long term,” the company said, adding that resources there would take years to develop.

A 2008 report by the U.S. Geological Survey estimated that the area north of the Arctic Circle holds 13 percent of the world’s undiscovered oil, and 30 percent of its undiscovered natural gas. (Related: “Pictures: Four New Offshore Drilling Frontiers”)

Wednesday, February 27, 2013 | By Great Energy Challenge | No Comments

The oil and gas industry promises “a few days of fracking” for “decades of … production.” But is it true?

Believe it or not, some people don’t buy the fracking boom story. Some predict bust. Others, more of a petering out. What gives? Let’s begin with a story about a lunch.

Lunch with a Skeptic

In the spring of 2008, I was anticipating a lunch meeting with Matthew Simmons. In the oil and gas industry Simmons was considered something of a legend or a pariah, depending on one’s point of view. Either way, he was an iconoclast.

Having served as an energy advisor to President George W. Bush, Simmons had become increasingly concerned about Saudi Arabia’s ability to keep its oil spigot flowing indefinitely. In his book “Twilight in the Desert: The Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy” (Wiley, 2005) Simmons predictedthat, with Saudi Arabian oil past peak production, hard times would fall on a world disproportionately dependent on Saudi oil to power its cars and stabilize prices.

Was he right? A good deal of debate surrounds the answer; some have said he was off his rocker, others have called him prescient (see here and here).

And while his predictions of $200 per barrel of oil by 2010 never came to fruition (prices peaked at about $145 per barrel in 2008 — click on chart below for history of prices), the financial crisis of 2008 might have had something to do with that.

Anyway, back to the lunch. I remember the day as sunny and blustery. Through the windows the trees swayed to and fro and the flowers on the azaleas held on for dear life. Inside, things were popping too; Simmons was full of energy, warm, forthcoming and absolutely sure of himself.

Eventually the conversation turned to shale gas, a topic whose buzz about the coming shale gas revolution had just begun to reach a fevered pitch. A couple of years later many experts (and some non-experts, such as yours truly in posts like this and this) would hail shale gas as a “game changer.”

But Simmons distanced himself from those “experts.” “It’s all hype,” he told me over lunch that blustery day, a sentiment he later conveyed to energy consultant Steve Andrews (co-founder of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil & Gas USA): “I’ve never seen the industry hype something crazier.”

When I asked him about such characterization, Simmons explained it had to do with the long-term productivity of fracked wells. The industry was claiming (and still is, by the way) that a single fracked well “can be in production for 20 to 40 years.” If it’s true, it’s quite a deal — frack a well, then stand back and pump out energy and profits for decades.

But the unconvinced Simmons argued that he’d seen the data from existing fracked wells and they simply did not support a decades-long production curve. He was convinced that the productivity of fracked wells rapidly declined with time — by 70 percent in the first year and another 20 percent in the second year, leaving only 10 percent for all those supposed decades of production.

That lunch-time discussion was memorable and I was saddened to learn a couple of years later that Simmons had died.

Was He Wrong About Fracking?

Was Simmons just plain wrong about fracking and tight oil and shale gas? One could argue he was. Because of shale gas, natural gas prices are as low as they’ve been in more than a decade, coal usage in the United States is down, and tight oil production in the Bakken and Eagle Ford formations is on the rise. Because of tight oil and shale gas, America’s energy prospects have never been brighter. A recent report by the International Energy Agency predicts that the United Sates will become the world’s largest oil producer by 2020 and a net oil exporter by 2030.

Maybe Not

And yet, while the fracking business is booming, there are some naysayers out there who have argued that this particular king has no clothes. (See here, here, here and here.)

Now add J. David Hughes of the Post Carbon Institute to the naysayer list. Seeming to channel Simmons in the Comment section of last week’s edition of the journal Nature, Hughes claims that “the production of shale gas and oil is overhyped.” As Simmons did, he points to the rapid decline in production rates of fracked wells. Having studied the data from 65,000 U.S. shale wells from 30 shale-gas and 21 tight-oil fields, Hughes concludes that

“Wells decline rapidly within a few years. Those in the top five US plays typically pro­duced 80–95% less gas after three years. In my view, the industry practice of … inferring lifetimes of 40 years or more, is too optimistic.”*

Hughes argues that to keep total production up in the face of declining production from existing wells, the industry will need to continue to drill more and more wells in less productive areas — making the whole enterprise less profitable. Either production will halt or energy prices will head upwards.

Hughes closes out his comment with the following not-so-optimistic assessment of the promise of shale oil and gas:

“Governments and industry must recognize that shale gas and oil are not cheap or inex­haustible: 70% of US shale gas comes from fields that are either flat or in decline. And the sustainability of tight-oil production over the longer term is questionable. … Declaring US energy independence and laying plans to export the shale bounty is unwise.”

Could be that despite fracking and its current bounty, we’re not going to be able to drill our way to energy security after all.

__________________________

End Note

* New data [pdf] by the U.S. Energy Information Administration shows a similar steep drop-off in well productivity.

‘The Bag Ban’ kicks in on Friday. Grocery/stores will not have plastic bags. You must BYOB-Bring Your Own Bag. I know several stores have reusable bags to purchase on site too! Officials say Austinites use 263 million plastic bags per year! That’s a lot for just one area. Get your reusable bags ready by putting them in the trunk of your car, so you have a bag handy when you stop to shop! BYOB!!

Here’s a few tibits about ‘The Bag Ban’:

–Plastic Bags: If made of plastic, be made of a minimum thickness of 4.0 mil;

–Paper Bags: If made of paper, must contain a minimum of 40% recycled content beginning March 1, 2013, and contain a minimum 80% recycled content by March 1, 2014.

-Handles are not required for reusable paper carry-out bags with a height of less than 14 inches and width of less than 8 inches.

-Restaurant Bags, limited to recyclable paper bags used to take away prepared food. Single use plastic carryout bags allowed only where necessary to prevent moisture damage; examples include soups, sauces salads with dressing, and liquids. more here!

What if I don’t remember to bring a bag?

Austin businesses may provide any of the following types of reusable bags at checkout:

Cloth, fabric or other woven bags, with handles.

Paper bags, made of at least 40% recycled content, with handles. At least 80% recycled content required by March 1, 2014. Handles are not required for paper bags that are smaller than 8 inches wide and 14 inches tall.

Plastic bags (at least 4 mil thick) with handles. This is an industry term for a plastic bag’s thickness; “1 mil” is .001 inch. A 4-mil bag is about as thick as a freezer bag.

The ordinance does not require businesses to charge a fee for any bag, though they may set a price for reusable bags. Click here for more!

Tesla CEO Elon Musk offered a sort of parting gift to Energy Secretary Steven Chu Tuesday, as the pair were about to conclude a session at the ARPA-E Energy Innovation Summit near Washington, D.C.

Asking for a for a bit more time to make an announcement, Musk first said he thought the Department of Energy’s 2009 loan to the California-based electric carmaker had been a success. “We’re exporting cars, we’re selling powertrains to two of the most respected brands in the world … an electric car won Car of the Year last year. I mean, this is pretty good stuff,” Musk said of Tesla.

“So if people are going to attack the DOE for bloody Solyndra—honestly—then there should be some praise for the DOE when there is a success. So I want to make a public commitment, and we’re going to codify it, that Tesla’s going to cut the payment time in half of the loan.”

Last fall, the DOE asked Tesla to work out a faster repayment schedule for the $465 million loan, which it made to the company in 2009. The company agreed, speeding up the first payment, which was originally due this March. Musk’s commitment at ARPA-E cuts the overall payback time of 10 years by half.

Chu, who announced this month that he is stepping down as secretary, just smiled as the audience applauded.

Musk was also able to joke about his recent, heated flap with The New York Times over its account of a test drive that ended with Tesla’s Model S on the back of a flatbed truck. (See related post: “In Tesla Motors-NYT Spat, Cold Realities About Electric Cars.“) That piece sparked a war of words (and driving logs) between Musk and the reporter, John Broder.

Atlantic editor Steve Clemons, who moderated the session with Chu and Musk, noted that Musk’s first foray into business was the software company Zip2, in which the Times invested. “You actually helped take The New York Times online,” Clemons said.

“I think that’s called being hoisted on your own petard,” Musk replied.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, BP Capital founder T. Boone Pickens and others are appearing at the three-day ARPA-E (Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy) summit, which also spotlights a variety of projects the agency has funded. (See related story: “Storage, Biofuel Lead $156 Million in Energy Research Grants.”) The creation of ARPA-E was authorized by Congress in 2007 and it began funding projects in 2009.

THIS FRIDAY (2/22/tomorrow) we’re calling out all of our compost participants, our farmers and gardeners, or east Austin businesses and organizations, and our east side neighbors to come out and dance with us in street.

Our goal is to get as many COMPOSTERS, as many BIKES, and as many DOGS as we can in the video! Click here for more!

I responded, “It is far from ‘fact’ that only carbon-based and nuclear energy sources can meet the world’s needs. There are many studies showing that a combination of renewable sources can indeed meet that need. And that will be easier still with a rethinking of what we employ energy for and how it actually improves our lives.”

Then, almost on demand, up pops a post by the inestimable Amory Lovins and the Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) in which he responds to President Obama’s recent statement that we “need some big technological breakthrough” to tackle climate change:

Mr. President — our nation already has the technologies to protect the climate while advancing prosperity. Here’s how.

YourNational Renewable Energy Laboratoryshowed just last June how to produce 80 to 90 percent of America’s electricity from proven, reliable and increasingly competitive renewable sources like the sun and wind.

Lovins points to findings from his RMI book “Reinventing Fire” describing how a combination of energy efficiency and renewables can indeed meet the world’s future energy requirements. Energy efficiency, he writes, “can save 44 percent of projected 2050 electricity needs through proven building and industrial technologies that pay back far faster than any new source of supply. Wasting far less energy and getting the rest at lower and stable prices would powerfully boost jobs and growth.” (Similarly, a new report from the Alliance Commission on Energy Efficiency Policy says that we can double energy productivity by 2030.)

Lovins continues, “Conventional wisdom is wrong that solar and wind aren’t viable without a breakthrough in electricity storage. Analysis and experience prove that 60-80 percent solar and wind power — sited across a region, forecasted, and balanced by flexible supply and demand — can keep the lights on with often less storage or backup than traditional giant power stations need now. That’s how Germany, without adding storage, is already one-fourth renewable-powered, and at times last spring met over half its electric load just with solar power. A smart grid will make this even more successful and resilient.”

(You may have heard about the rather spectacular recent claim on Fox News that solar power works better in Germany than it could here because “they’ve got a lot more sun than we do.” There are many reasons, all involving policies, incentives and economics, that solar power has been more successful there than here, but amount of sunshine is definitively not one of them.)

My bet is that the commenter above could provide a bunch of similarly confident-sounding reports supporting his statement.

My father, who was a science journalist (and covered some of the early environmental stories), had a plaque on his desk with the quote “There are three sides to every story. Yours, mine and the facts.” But that was before the age of instant digital communications, sound bites and Citizens United. Now, it seems, there are just two sides: your facts and my facts. And anything, repeated often enough, now takes on the feeling of fact.

And beliefs have become confused with facts. (Making light of this, Neil deGrasse Tyson recently tweeted: “I’m often asked whether I believe in Global Warming. I now just reply with the question: “Do you believe in Gravity?”)

It’s become increasingly difficult to ascertain whose facts are, in fact, factual. I subscribe to the “follow the money” rule, or rather, don’t follow the money. Self-interest is an incredibly strong force and money, these days, is its enabler. Virtually every climate denier’s “fact” can be traced to “research” or reports funded by corporate, usually fossil fuel, interests.

The counterclaim, frequently utilized in “climategate” and elsewhere, is that scientists manipulate facts in order to secure funding for their research — as if that funding amounts to even a miniscule fraction of what corporate grant recipients and lobbyists receive. (Even that, by the way, doesn’t always work.) And never mind that scientific findings go through strenuous competitive peer review before being labeled facts, while the only review of most corporate statements is by their public relations departments.

I know that this “not following the money” rule is a dangerously broad one and subject to the great observation by Mark Twain that all generalizations are false. But I’ve seen little to lead me to believe otherwise.

Climate
change is impacting health! Heat waves
and elevated levels of air pollution (ozone) are already harming our health and
we expect a minimum temperature increase of 3-5◦C by 2100 or 5-10◦Fwith little change in our output. Four
out of five Americans have been victims of an extreme weather event in the last
ten years, losing homes and jobs. Tornadoes, thunderstorms, and droughts
resulting in a loss of crops and price hikes on many food items last summer
impacted the health of children whose parents can’t afford food. Water supplies
are also at significant risk. Epidemics of dengue fever, the increasing range
of Lyme disease and other insect borne diseases are occurring more due to
milder winters and hotter summers.

What is PSR doing on this issue?

PSR
brings the message of health threats due to climate change to our policymakers,
to medical associations, and to the public.
We advocate closing polluting coal-burning power plants. We study the
health impacts of hydraulic fracturing and bring health professionals to our
legislatures and governors calling for a ban until and if this practice can be
done without fouling our air, our groundwater and releasing high levels of
methane, a very potent greenhouse gas.
We also call for solutions such as increasing energy efficiency to
reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and to develop healthy sources of
electricity such as solar, wind and geothermal.

What specific health (or other) impacts
from climate change have you seen in your own region? / What makes this issue
personal to you?

I
have friends who were stranded in hospitals during Hurricane Katrina and in New
York City during Hurricane Sandy. It is horrifying to think
about caring for and evacuating intensive care patients in the dark because the
hospitals were not prepared for the intensity of the storms. These events are increasing in severity.

Both
the American Medical Association and the American Nursing Association acknowledge
the consensus of the scientific community on climate change caused by humankind
primarily from burning fossil fuels. They call on all providers to speak to
patients and educate their communities to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and
to prepare for higher temperatures and sea level as well as extreme weather
events.

Is human-caused climate change widely
accepted by individuals in the medical community?

Unfortunately
not! In a review article written by a
PSR member, there were many letters received denouncing the journal for
covering the issue.

PSR
will be making every effort to share this very concise and well-documented
information with the public and health professionals in efforts to spur
preparation and mitigation of future effects.
In a fact-based document such as this, it is hard to convey or
measure the health impacts of storms such as Sandy and Katrina which are
overwhelming to families who lost everything or are trying to repair when
foundations are waterlogged and overrun with mold.

Are hospitals and medical professionals
preparing for climate change? How?

Some
hospitals have joined an organization called Practice Greenhealth and have signed
on to the climate challenge, which requires building improvements and educating
on climate change. They are recycling, installing energy efficient features,
improving their heating systems and installing solar panels. Some hospital
systems are educating their staff and communities to prepare for extreme
weather and take action to reduce the severity of climate change. Others, along
with some cities or counties are doing nothing. It is these people we need to
reach.

The Fort Belvoir Community Hospital in Virginia, a LEED Gold building, has green roofs, efficient HVAC system, indoor air quality plans, and more to support human and environmental health. Photo: US Army Corps of Engineers

What can communities do to adapt to the
health impacts of climate change?

PSR
health professionals are educating and working with some cities and counties
who recognize the need to prepare for the changes such as a 3 to 5 degree
Fahrenheit increase, or a sea level rise of over two feet in the coming 50 years. Communities can bolster their public health
system to add warning systems and preparations for heat waves and extreme weather,
and evaluate the water shortages that will occur. Well-prepared cities and
counties have climate change plans which take health into consideration.

What are the health benefits to addressing climate change?

The
health or co-benefits of cutting fossil fuels are myriad. Burning fossil fuels causes a majority of our
air and water pollution. The secondary benefits of reducing coal, oil, gasoline
and natural gas use will provide cleaner air and water. Cutting red meat from our diets reduces
methane production and will reduce heart disease and environmental degradation
from beef production.

What gives you hope?

Communities that
are addressing climate change and preparing for impacts are becoming more
resilient to all kinds of threats. They
are often increasing pride and cooperation across city and county government,
business and social entities. Buildings
that are more energy efficient are better places to work, with more natural
sunlight, better insulation and show improved productivity and fewer sick days.
I also am very hopeful that we have a
president who is speaking out on the issue and I hope there will be more market
incentives to make the changes we need!